Bitumen impregnated cellulose roofing elements have been known for a long time. They are made from an aqueous composition of cellulose fibers that is dried, treated, shaped, and impregnated with hot bitumen. Various types are known such as corrugated panels and panel accessories such as ridge tiles.
Corrugated panel type elements present the advantage of being suitable for being made at least for the most part by continuous methods starting from a continuous cellulose mat of density that is sufficient for it to be stable during the process of fabricating roofing elements. That stability is the result of the fact that the continuous cellulose mat is dried at least in part while it is being worked.
The present invention relates more specifically to optimizing the fabrication of ridge tiles.
Conventional methods of fabricating ridge tiles out of bitumen impregnated cellulose have relatively low yield since a discontinuous processing step is performed in which an individual cellulose plate is pressed in a mold. This also results in a relatively large amount of handling because the elements that are treated are in the form of individual plates.
One of the difficulties encountered in performing a continuous method is the need to cut up the continuous cellulose mat into individual roofing elements. Such cutting can be a source of difficulties, in particular when the mat for cutting has already been impregnated with bitumen and/or when it presents a surface or an outline with a shape that is curved. This leads in particular to risks of the cutting machines becoming clogged and/or of the roofing elements becoming deformed.
Proposals have thus been made for machines and methods that optimize the fabrication of ridge tiles and that present a degree of versatility in the types of ridge tiles that can be obtained.